Main Office:
Welcome to Hainault Forest Community Association Neighbourhood Nursery.
The nursery is part of the Hainault Forest Community Association and is managed by the Association’s Management Committee and the Nursery Manager.
The nursery opened in 1980 in direct response to the needs of the local community for childcare. Then in 2003 the nursery became part of the neighbourhood nursery initiative scheme. This is a scheme funded by the Government to enable parents to return to work or further education who also live within the assigned areas.
The Nursery and Association is a non-profit making business. All funds are used to run, improve and extend the facilities available for the nursery and Community Association members.
NURSERY AIMS
Hainault Forest Community Association Neighbourhood Nursery is actively inclusive of families and professionals of all ethnicity, culture or religion, home language, family background, special educational needs, disability, gender or ability.
We recognise and respect that each child’s needs and stage of development are individual. We aim to value, respect, nurture and celebrate these developments whilst encouraging each child to develop life long learning skills within a safe, happy and stimulating environment.
Each child and family will be welcomed into our nursery and will always be assigned a key worker who will build a close and secure relationship to allow safe and happy learning to be achieved.
Each key worker will observe, evaluate, and plan individually for each child to allow them the opportunity to access both self initiated and adult focused lead activities using both the indoor and outdoor learning environment.
We value every parent as their child’s first educator and welcome parents to work in partnership with the nursery team to encourage their child’s potential.
OPENING TIMES
The nursery opens from 8am and closes at 6pm. We are open every weekday for fifty-one weeks a year. We close for all statutory bank holidays. In addition the nursery also closes for three days a year for whole staff training.
FEES
The fees the nursery charge is for your child’s place and are non-refundable for absence including sickness and family holidays. We charge for all closures including bank holidays. There is no charge for Christmas day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day (provided they fall Monday to Friday). Fees must be paid weekly/monthly, in advance, by cheque,direct debit or cash.
The fees are as follows:
Full time |
Under two |
Over two |
8am – 6pm |
£180.00 per week |
£175.00 per week |
£37.00 per day |
£36.00 per day |
|
Part time(half day) |
£115.00 per week |
£105.00 per week |
Am 8am-1pm |
£23.00 per am session |
£21.00 per am session |
Pm 1pm-6pm |
£23.00 per pm session |
£21.00 per pm session |
(Effective from 6th April 2009)
OFSTED
We are registered by The Government’s official body Ofsted. We are inspected regularly by Ofsted to check that we are adhering to the national childcare standards and foundation stage education standards. Our current Ofsted inspection report is available on request and via the Ofsted website.
OPENING TIMES
The nursery is registered to care for seventy children ranging from three months to four years. We offer both part time and full-time places for all age children. The minimum a child can attend the nursery is two days or two sessions. The children are organised into three rooms, as follows.
BABY ROOM
This unit cares and develops our youngest children from three months to two years.
TODDLER ROOM
This room cares and develops our middle-aged children two years to three years.
FOUNDATION STAGE ROOM
This room cares and develops our oldest children from three years to four years.
THE EARLY YEARS FOUNDATION STAGE
Introduction
The Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) brings together: Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage, The Birth to Three Matters framework and the National Standards for Under 8s Daycare and Childminding, building a coherent and flexible approach to care and learning. All providers are required to use the EYFS to ensure that whatever setting parents choose, they can be confident that their child will receive a quality experience that
supports their development and learning. The Early Years Foundation Stage is made up of six areas of learning and development. These structure the skills, knowledge and experiences appropriate for babies and young children as they grow. All areas of learning and development are underpinned by the principles of the Early Years Foundation Stage, the areas of learning are:
Personal, social and emotional
This is about knowing who your are, where you fit in and feeling good about yourself. It is about developing respect for others, making friends and wanting to learn.
Communication, language and literacy
This is about children becoming good listeners and confident speakers. As children develop listening and speaking skills they build the foundation for literacy, making sense of verbal and visual signs and eventually for reading and writing. It is also about children exploring and enjoying a variety of books, learning about and using words and writing in different situations.
Problem solving, reasoning and numeracy
This is about children developing their understanding of numbers, measurements, patterns, shape and space in enjoyable ways where they can explore, learn, practise and talk about them.
Knowledge and understanding of the world
This is about children solving problems, making decisions, experimenting, predicting, planning and questioning in different situations. It is also about exploring and finding out about their environment, people and places that have significance in their lives.
Physical
This is about children developing and practising their physical skills and increasing an understanding of how their bodies work and what they need to do to be healthy and safe.
Creative
This is about children exploring and sharing their thoughts, ideas and feeling through a variety of art, design, technology, music, movement, dance and imaginative and role play activities. Childrens response to what they see hear and experience through their senses are individual and the way they represent experiences is valuable and unique.
At the Hainault Forest Community Association Nursery we ensure that each child’s learning and development occur as an outcome of their individual interests and abilities.
Observing and recording children’s progress
Each child will be observed during their time at nursery by their key worker to establish where they are within their development and learning stage. With this observation information staff then evaluate and plan individual activities to develop your child further with their learning.
Key worker
As children enter the nursery they are assigned a key worker. This adult is your first point of contact with the nursery. They are responsible for your child’s individual needs. They are also responsible for keeping you informed of your child’s development progress through observations and planning. Your key worker will review your child’s progress every six months and during transition parents are welcome to meet with the key worker if required.
Children will differ a lot with regard to settling into the nursery. We try to make this period as smooth as possible. To enable us to do this we have a policy of a minimum of two weeks for every child to settle into the nursery. You or someone who knows your child will need to be available to stay with your child during the settling in period. This period of time allows you, your child and your key worker to develop a close relationship. This relationship will enable your key worker to help your child feel secure and to enable your child to develop to their full potential.
We provide breakfast, lunch and afternoon tea to children who are in attendance. All meals are prepared on the premises by our qualified chef. Our chef aims to provide a balanced menu including any special dietary requirements your child may have. Our menu is displayed in the reception area of the nursery. All the children eat meals together in the dining area. The children sit within key groups with their key worker; this gives the children consistency of care and allows adults time to spend with their small groups encouraging many areas of development. Every fourth Wednesday we hold a family breakfast where you can stay and have tea and toast with your child. If your child requires juice or formula milk and bottles these need to be provided by yourself.
If your child becomes ill during the day your key worker we will ring you to come and collect your child.
We cannot give any medicines unless they are prescribed for your child from their doctor.
There are occasions when we may ask for you to obtain a doctor’s certificate. This assists us to ensure it is safe for your child to be attending nursery. There are a variety of reasons for this, an example is cross contamination.
Please tell or ring your key worker if your child is going to be absent from nursery.
We have accident and incident forms where we record any incidents that happen throughout the day. We ask you to sign this to acknowledge that this information has been passed onto you. All bumped heads incidents will be reported to you for you to decide what to do next. Please remember staff are trained first aiders and not doctors.
Every other month on the fourth Wednesday during family breakfast a health visitor will be on site for weighing and advice.
Parents/carers need to provide two complete sets of spare clothes for their
children in a clear-labelled bag that can be left at the nursery if required.
If your child requires nappies and wipes these need to be provided by yourself.
The nursery staff endeavour to keep track of clothing removed from children, however accidents and mistakes happen so we encourage you to clearly label all clothing to help with this problem.
We welcome children with additional needs whether these are medical or educational and work to assist them to develop to their full potential. We work in partnership with many outside agencies who give us support and guidance to assist us to meet a child’s individual needs. We aim to identify children with additional needs because research shows that early intervention helps children develop to their full potential. All concerns are shared with parents and referrals are made to outside agencies with parental consent referrals.
We regularly use the local community facilities such as library, shops and parks. We always keep to the Ofsted ratio requirements whenever we are out and about.
We work closely with other agencies to protect children in our care. As an under 5’s placement we are duty-bound by the Children Act and National Standards. The nursery will make a referral to the social work team if we feel your child is at risk. We will always try to discuss this with you first.
We have a behaviour policy, which states our overall aim is for the children to treat each other, equipment and their learning environment with respect and to care for one another. We also expect parents and carers to follow the behaviour guidelines, which are found displayed in the reception area.
This means parents, carers, children and staff will not be discriminated against regarding their race, religious backgrounds, gender, sexual orientation, disability or language. All actions will be challenged whether physical or verbal that go against this policy.
We aim to resolve any concerns or complaints you may have through informal agreement with the nursery. We welcome your comments, which may help us improve our service to you. Complaints will be responded to within 15 days. If you feel that your complaint has not been dealt with fully you may ring our registering body Ofsted on 0845 4771 601 to proceed with your complaint further.
We value the support of parent/carers and view you as the most important people in your child’s life. We work in partnership with you and aim to assist you to feel part of the nursery welcoming any contributions you can offer. To enable you to become involved with the nursery and its policymaking, we have a parent forum that meets three times a year and all parents are welcome. To keep you up to date with all new ideas and changes with the nursery we have a nursery newsletter that is released every 4 to 6 weeks.
Our nursery is open from 8am till 6pm, 5 days a week. During these hours parents are able to drop off and collect their children when required. However, should this be after 10am we ask that the nursery are informed so that the chef can cater accordingly. Staff are on site from 7.45am for “setting up” purposes only and cannot allow access prior to 8am. The nursery closes at 6pm sharp. Any child collected later than 6pm will be charged a lateness fee from the second offence. Families that access morning sessional care will be charged the lateness fee from 1pm. Charges are £10 up until 1.15pm/6.15pm then a further £5 for every five minutes thereafter. The late child policy comes into place for any child whose parent/carer fails to inform the nursery of their lateness.
